TV Gets Social

John Moore from Interpublic Group’s Mullen agency has said ‘We’re in the early, early stages of what is now kind of being deemed ‘social TV.’ It all started with multi-player games and is branching out from there as over a quarter of 18 to 24 year olds are interested in adding social media features to their TV. After having profiles and gaming buddies, the Y Generation don’t want mindless TV any more. It is expected that TV companies will increasingly find ways to connect to Facebook, Twitter and other social sites to give new meaning to ‘watching TV.’

This could be the answer for companies who are desperately trying to keep their finger on the pulse, monitoring what people are saying about their shows. If it is done through the TV, during the show it will be a lot easier to keep an eye on opinion. Disney ABC has already been exploring ideas by allowing views of its video player to read comments by producers and writers, meanwhile adding their own comments.

Parks Associates has recently delivered a new report from research showing that some of the most desired social features would be being able to talk to people watching the same program and looking at lists of the most popular shows. While many TV companies attempts to go online has crashed and burnt, the majority of Gen Yers already spend more time online than they do in front of the TV and the future looks even more plugged in for the generation after them, so it’s time TV got on the band wagon.

Fox TV tried some of these ideas out on their channel by running tweet comment and comments by those involved in making the programs, over two popular reruns. However unsurprisingly viewers complained that the text was annoying, running across the picture.

PARC is carrying on the flame though, currently testing new technology that will allow you to chat with distant friends and if the TV senses that you have far too much to say it can pause the program for you while you finish your conversation. While having experimented with microphones PARC found that some of the conversation got confused as friends couldn’t see your body language, and when usually somebody would show they wanted to carry on watching TV they would turn back to the TV screen, with only microphones this was harder to grasp.

SplashCast Media have also been playing around with Facebook, adding a chatter app where TV shows can be played on Facebook and you can chat along side, you can invite friends in, like playing poker online or see what others have said at the same point in the video stream. While they said that most comments were pretty mindless it increased viewing time by 42%.

Hopes are high for social media  in TV as many TV companies it will be that extra push to bring people to their shows, however it is not predicted to be a hit for another 5 or 10 years.

Links for further reading:

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/gen_y_says_i_want_my_social_tv.php

http://adage.com/mediaworks/article?article_id=140545

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2005/03/parc_to_make_tv.html

http://www.socialmedia.biz/2009/07/14/the-future-of-television-social-tv/

Communications